nashuaworldcup Chapter 265 Influence
Chapter 265 Influence
"One high-explosive shell loaded!"
"emission!"
A 76mm shell blasted open the tightly closed iron-clad wooden city gate, scattering fragments. The explosive charge detonated beneath the city wall, turning the stubborn rocks that had stood there for hundreds of years into rubble.
Saints wielding weapons kept trying to charge at the Amerlansi army, but despite repeated "persuasion" from machine guns and artillery, not a single one was able to touch the Amerlansi troops.
Waving holy cross banners, the fanatics, clearly dressed in ill-fitting equipment and tattered clothes, leaped about, drinking the "Holy Water of Fearlessness" from the courtroom sip by sip, transforming it into the power that burned their bodies and minds.
Silent and filled with fanaticism, they charged toward the Amerlansi troops, but reality did not go as they wished. The angels and heavenly hymns in their illusion did not actually exist; all that remained were the sounds of gunfire and explosive propellants.
Most of them had never been on the battlefield before, and a considerable number of them did not want to participate in the war directly. However, under the secret rituals of the fanatical inquisitors and priests in the courtroom, they had long since become tools of manipulation.
This is precisely why the Inquisition stands firm—once the "holy water of fanaticism" is distributed to unsuspecting individuals, they immediately become fanatical religious madmen. They insist that they have seen angels and goddesses, that they have heard heaven praising their names, that they have seen their names engraved in the register of heaven, and that they will go to heaven after death.
Bullets and shells were reaping their lives. No one could get within fifty meters. The advance of the Amelansi armored infantry was indeed halted, but by hundreds of thousands of fanatical believers who had ingested the holy water.
With ammunition depleted, Alice immediately activated emergency measures – there were no railways within the church's territory, and no matter how hard the National Railway Group tried, it would not be able to lay tracks to the front lines in the short term.
Operation "Express Convoy" was led by the Logistics Department. The army mobilized trucks from several motorized units and transported hundreds of trucks from the country to form the "Express Convoy". Countless truck drivers, whether soldiers or civilians, were conscripted. They set off from the town of Ekawi, the end of the railway built by Amelansi, which is 20 kilometers north of Farollenza, and traveled nearly 100 kilometers south to reach the front line.
"A truck should be equipped with two to three drivers. The truck should not stop in the middle of the journey, and should keep a distance of ten meters. It should head south quickly."
Severely overloaded M35 trucks formed a line stretching over a hundred kilometers, transporting weapons and ammunition to a freight transit station on the outskirts of the holy city, and then returning almost non-stop.
Now entering the final stage of the offensive, the front line is consuming 150,000 rounds of ammunition of various types every day, which is considered "extremely high" even for Amerlane. Since the start of the war, the entire campaign has consumed 3 million rounds of artillery shells of various types.
Transportation was slightly better in the northern theater, but the southern theater could only rely on shipping. Against this backdrop, the Republic of Corsica, Brittany, and even the authorities in Naples benefited. In the first half of this year, the government of Emeransia announced cooperation with the governments of these countries to build large-scale integrated ports and shipyards in these countries to meet the increasingly severe demand for shipping capacity.
Now, in the latter half of 661, as autumn arrives and leaves fall, Brittany's new port—South Norman Port—was inaugurated. Sensing a business opportunity, the Brittany government immediately designated South Norman Port as a "high-tech industrial development zone" and announced corresponding preferential policies for businesses.
The reason is simple: Port Carol is already incredibly busy. Every day, cargo ships from Amerlane alone can fill the entire port area. Even with the introduction of the full set of Amerlane's advanced port technology, it is already overburdened.
Cargo ships lined up like steel walls on the sea, including new steel cargo ships, old motor sailing ships, and steam paddle steamers, forming an unbelievably long queue under the tug of Breton port power barges, waiting to enter the port to unload their cargo.
Brittany's territory is not large, about the size of a large region in Emeransia, but it is large enough to build a second comprehensive port. But that's not all. While the port of South Norman is under construction, the South Norman Airport of Brittany is also under construction. Brittany, which is now accelerating its transformation into a production and R&D center for electronic magic equipment, needs to be more efficient.
The newly appointed Speaker of the Council of Brittany is a pragmatist who welcomes all new things that are beneficial to development. Especially after returning from Emerald, he issued the slogan: "Aviation is the future of Brittany's transportation!" and began planning the construction of new aviation facilities.
The same was true for the Republic of Corsica, not far from Brittany. With the support of Amelansi, the Corsican Republic Guard successfully quelled the rebellion throughout the archipelago, and the port built by Amelansi brought a spring breeze, driving the economic recovery of this backward island nation.
As the economy of the Republic of Corsica gradually improved, thanks to its port serving as a transit point for goods in the central ocean, the Naples Rebellion and the subsequent intervention of the International Brigades in the church civil war were like a godsend. The sudden increase in shipping demand, along with the presence of the only near-modern port in the southern part of the central ocean close to the church, gave the Republic of Corsica a unique advantage.
The casualties of war needed to be treated, and Naples was too dangerous, so the location of the International Brigades' General Logistics Hospital was naturally placed there. Corsica had a modern hospital almost overnight. The building materials transported from Amerlane by long distances were naturally not as good as those that could be mined locally. Bai Ling quickly borrowed 3 million Amerlane gold notes from the Amerlane National Bank and quickly introduced Amerlane's advanced technology and experts to explore the island's mineral resources and establish forest farms and mines. The island is rich in natural resources, and there are also considerable iron ore resources in the central part of the main island.
Backed by Amelansi, factories sprang up and repair shops were established. The initial industrial development was steadily improving the economy of the Republic of Corsica. However, it was foreseeable that due to its population size, Corsica would not have the capacity to build heavy industry. But Bai Ling's goal was not heavy industry.
This is a path similar to that of Brittany, but not entirely the same.